A: Well, there could be a dozen different reasons for that. One of them is this: Not one whom I’ve ever met has ever come into the full and complete realization of his Christhood. Not one. I have never known one, and I’ve never known one to make the claim. I have met not only some of the great metaphysical teachers in our country; I have met some of the greatest mystics in the entire world. I’m close to some of them, and they’re close to me. But never have I met one who has made the claim of attaining conscious realization of the Christhood in its fullness.
Now then, every one of them does attain the full realization of the Christhood sometimes in meditation. Sometimes in meditation, you attain your realization of the Christ so completely that you as a human being disappear. You have no sense of mind or body whatsoever, but as you come out of that, you take on more of your humanhood again. One of the reasons is this: For a person to accept and demonstrate their full Christhood, they must leave the world, even as the Master did. The Master never demonstrated the full Christhood while he was on earth. If he had, they couldn’t have crucified him on the cross, and they couldn’t have made blood run.
You remember that in the Garden of Gethsemane he prayed, “Let this cup pass from me. If not, then I’ll take it, but if possible, let it pass.” He had not attained his complete Christhood. But after the resurrection, he did. When he did, he disappeared from the haunts of men. So it is today. It is possible for a mystic to attain the full measure of Christhood, but if they do, and want to remain there, they can’t come back to earth and say, “I’m going to give a metaphysical lecture to help you,” because they will have again accepted your humanhood, and in accepting your humanhood, they themselves will have come back into this sense of humanhood. The only time that one may attain the fullness is when they have dropped the entire world from their being. That’s number one.
There are other reasons. Your teacher, your leader, your practitioner gets to the place like Caruso. Those of you who saw that picture, “Caruso,” will remember where he says, “We think we have a voice, a talent, but we haven’t. The talent has us. And it governs us.” He says, “You know, sometimes we want to be in one place, but the voice has to be in another place, so we have to be there with it.” So it is in this work. Never think for a moment that we have government or jurisdiction over our lives. This thing that has touched us has control over us, and it does with us as it will.
So, there are times when we should be away for ten days or two weeks or a month of meditation, of communion, of writing out these unfolding ideas. We may want to do it, and just at that time, some patient needs us, or some group needs us, or some classes must be at that time, or some conference comes. So, you leave your forty days that you should be on the mountaintop for complete realization so you can come down and serve your fellow man. In that degree, you deprive yourself of the opportunity for greater personal unfoldment. In the end, it’s no loss; it doesn’t make any difference. But it accounts for the fact that there are times when the human sense of existence presses in, and a teacher or a leader may come under that pressure.
The same thing happens to physicians when they think too much of their patients and too little of their own health. Here we are not concerned with our health, but what is important to us is opportunity for meditation, for communion with God, for living and moving in a state of divine consciousness away from the world. Of course, if we could have more opportunities for that, we could also do better healing work. And so that is the reason why all of our healings are not instantaneous. It is also the reason why at times, we ourselves come under some claim of human existence. Always remember that the word itself is pure, complete, and perfect, but those who voice it have not yet attained the completeness of its realization and revelation.
1 This excerpt is from Recording #606B, 1951 Second Portland Series, “Transition from Law to Grace.” It is posted with kind permission from the Estate of Joel Goldsmith, which holds the copy protection on the recorded classes and the copyright on the transcripts. The full transcript of this recording is available at www.joelgoldsmith.com or by calling1-800-922-3195.